1 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

“Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle.

A Self-Convened Conference in Turin
(April, 25-27, 1969)

Elena Dellapiana
elena.dellapiana@polito.it
Department of Architecture & Design, Polytechnic of Turin

Architect, PhD, she is Associate Professor of Architecture and Design History. She is a
scholar of architecture, town and design history of the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries,
and she has published several papers and books on Italian and international architects,
on the transmission of architectural culture in art academies and applied arts museums,
and on the discussion about historical sources and historicism. She collaborated to the
books Made in Italy. Rethinking a Century of Italian Design edited by K. Fallan and G. Lees
Maffey (Bloomsbury, 2013) and Storia dell’architettura italiana: L’Ottocento edited by A.
Restucci (Milan: Electa, 2005) and she took part to several research groups. Among her
recent publications are: Il design della ceramica in Italia (1850-2000) (Milan: Electa, 2010), Il
design degli architetti italiani 1920-2000, with F. Bulegato (Milan: Electa, 2014), Una storia
dell’architettura contemporanea, with G. Montanari, (Torino: Utet, 2015).

ABSTRACT
This paper aims to analyse an unrecognized episode that occurred in Turin at the height
of the 1968 protests. The conference was organized at the Faculty of Architecture by
the “Committee of assistants”, with the support of colleagues and students from the
humanities and science faculties, and it coincided with the 1969 celebrations in memory
of the liberation of Italy from the Nazi-Fascists. Many important guests took part to
this event: architects such as Archigram, Architecture Principe, Utopie, Yona Friedman,
Archizoom, Paolo Soleri and Aldo Giurgola, and people involved in the debate such as
Gianni Vattimo, Carlo Olmo, Gian Mario Bravo and Aimaro Isola. The three dense days were
scrupulously documented in minutes published by the magazine Marcatré. Apart from
them, in this paper other sources have been investigated: unpublished documents, direct
testimonies and echoes of the event published in national and international magazines of
the time. As one of the few occasions to link categories such as Utopia and Revolution,
the conference provides a glimpse of both the euphoric atmosphere and the uncertainty
surrounding the social and political role of the architects and the design. In their speeches,
the guests brought up themes such as the incipient ecological crisis, the criticism of the
western capitalist city and the contamination with non-architectural disciplines. All the
contradictions in the political confrontation and in the professional scene emerged from
the ensuing debate, which included even harsh discussions about the use of ideologies
and political assessments. All these items developed in the subsequent paths taken by
the protagonists.

https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2611-0075/7888
ISSN 2611-0075
Copyright © 2018 Elena Dellapiana

4.0

KEYWORDS
Utopia; Revolution; Architect’s role; social struggle
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 2

FIG. 1 Turin Faculty occupation, 1963, from Casabella 287 (May 1964), p. 7

Introduction: communication and reception of a revolt

Marcatré, a magazine otherwise dedicated to experimental art and 1. Marcatré, rivista di cultura contemporanea
(magazine of contemporary culture),
literature, opened to architecture too in its second number (1964) with was born in 1963, in relation with the
poetic avant-gard group Gruppo 63; it was
the column Architettura supervised by Paolo Portoghesi and a paper directed by Eugenio Battisti, and divided
into sections entrusted to several young
written by Domenico Cecchini and Francesco Cellini1 which told about intellectuals: Sylvano Bussotti (music),
Diego Carpitella (music and theatre), Gillo
the occupation of the Rome Architecture faculty quarters. Portoghesi, Dorfles (industrial design), Umberto Eco
(literature and semiology) Roberto Leydi
in turn, well introduced the general subject of the column: “As we think (ethnomusicology), Piero Gamacchio (late
director), Vittorio Gelmetti (music), Vittorio
Gregotti (architetture), Vito Pandolfi (theatre),
that architecture has to be criticism, acknowledgment, judgment rather Paolo Portoghesi (architecture) Edoardo
Sanguineti (poetry). See Elisabetta Mondello,
than aesthetic, we enter into the subject by documenting facts that testify Gli Anni delle riviste: le riviste letterarie dal
1945 agli anni Ottanta con un repertorio di
the will of struggle of the new generations to conquer for the architects 173 periodici, (Lecce: Milella 1985), 136;
Riccardo Zecchini, Marcatrè Rivista di Cultura
a ruffling transformation of the structures that are ever more precise contemporanea http://www.verbapicta.it/
dati/riviste/macratre.-notiziario-di-cultura-
and responsible”2. Furthermore, the two authors of the paper focused contemporanea; Domenico Cecchini e
Francesco Cellini, “Colpo di stato in Facoltà”,
immediately on the translation of this statement in the “real” life of Italian Marcatré, II,2,1 (1964): 76-80.
architecture: the squatting of the faculties of Architecture in Rome and 2. Ivi: 76.

Milan, referring to Engels’ and Fourier’s thought about the relationship

between politics and technique in solving housing problems. While the
‘official’ architectural magazines (such as Casabella and Domus) seemed
not so interested in political events, Marcatrè was really engaged as a
“Notiziario di cultura contemporanea” (Contemporary culture bulletin)
and showed from the early beginning a movementist attitude, even in its
imagery. Its founder and director Eugenio Battisti, an Art History teacher
at the University of Genova, titled indeed the first editorial “La tavolata e
3. Eugenio Battisti, “La tavolata e il fumoir”,
il fumoir”3 (The Table and the Smoking room), to represent the informal Marcatre, 1 (November 1963): 10.
atmosphere of the newsroom meetings.
4. First squatting were in Venice (1958 and
1960) and Turin (1959) to protest against
On the contrary, Domus, directed by Gio Ponti , and Casabella, directed the introduction of some restrictive rules;
Francisca Insulza, Studenti, architetti, città:
by Ernesto Nathan Rogers, were almost proof to the political debate, in da facoltà d’élite a università di massa, PHD
Dissertation, “Storia e valorizzazione del
particular during the first struggles at the Faculties of Architecture which Patrimonio Architettonico, Urbanistico e
Ambientale”, Politecnico di Torino 2009, sup.
began in Italy in 19634. Only in 1964, an almost complete number of G. Montanari.
3 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

Casabella [Fig. 1] was dedicated to the debate on Architecture teaching,

mixing students’ or young assistants’ reports on the local claims with
expert professors’ – such as Quaroni or Benevolo – considerations, with
the aim of showing an overview of the existing architectural schools5. In 5. Casabella, 287 (May 1964).

this number there were several articles from the Faculty of Architecture
in Turin: Piero Derossi, one of the young assistants, told about the general
asset of the superior instruction, the responsibility of the institution and
6. Piero Derossi, “Responsabilità del
the architect’s role in the changing society6, underlining the necessity sapere”, Ivi: 12-13.
of a new ethic approach in designing cities and houses, with a stronger
awareness of the non-neutrality of the technique and of the sectoriality of
disciplines. Biagio Garzena, a professor in Venice but professionally active
in Turin, wrote about the relationship between the teaching system and
7. Biagio Garzena, “Questioni sulla ricerca
research activities7 and a group of students signed an accurate report of nelle Facoltà”, Ivi: 18-19.

the defects of the Turin school in relation with the academic organization,
the teachers’ quality and the economic and social characteristics of the
city – a ‘one company town’ deeply related with the FIAT firm. They wrote
about the cultural and economic depression and the consequent solutions
imagined and debated during the conference Facoltà di Architettura e
territorio (Faculty of Architecture and Territory) organized in 1962 by a 8. Students group (Capellino, Coletti, De
Giorgi, Magnaghi, Morbelli, Perona, Preto,
committee of both professors and students8. The year before, Bruno Zevi, Rosso, Sistri, Viale), “Torino. Monopolio e
depressione culturale”, ivi: 24-27.
founder and director of the magazine L’Architettura – Cronache e storia,
agreed with the students who squatted the Faculties in Milan and Turin,
9. Bruno Zevi, “La rivolta degli studenti
asking for their more substantial participation in schools cultural growth9. architetti”, L’Architettura, 92 (June 1963):
74-75.
In 1964 Marcatrè stated again about the aftermath of occupation in the
Faculty of Rome, reporting the professors’ “obstructionism and verbosity”
versus the students’ claim for “commitment and responsibility” even in a
“fascist” law system, the clash between the groups and the growth of a 10. Domenico Cecchini e Francesco Cellini,
“Impegno e responsabilità”, Marcatrè, 3
new political and cultural awareness . It is evident how the magazine’s
10
(February 1964): 79-83; they referred exactly
to Bruno Zevi’s speech and his ability to
editorial line pushed towards a political reading of the protests and a mediate between students who rejected
dialogue and the arrogance of many
relationship between the architect’s profession and the problem of the professors.

growth of capitalist cities. Edilizia Moderna dedicated a complete number

to what happened during 1963 – yet published it in 196511 – dedicating
some pages to the crisis of the teaching practice pointed out during the
faculties occupations and collecting documents (from tabloids, minutes
of assemblies and specialized magazines – among whom Marcatré) that
reported the different statements about this item12.
11. Edilizia Moderna, nn. 82-83 (1965): The
magazine, directed by Vittorio Gregotti
was focused, in these years, on the
industrialization of architecture and the
overlapping of languages with a strong
awareness of the growing of massmediatic
society.
12. Red. “Facoltà in crisi”, Ivi: 23-24.

Later on, between 1967 and 1968, the topics most covered in the
magazines were, on one hand, the student protests and more generally
the wide spreading counterculture and, on the other hand, the architectural
projects driven by experimental groups.

Marcatré, Casabella, Domus, L’Architettura, Necropoli and other magazines

reported on the protests in Italian and international universities, on the
contestations of exhibitions – Milan Triennale, Venice Biennale, Kassel
Documenta or those organized by the American Museums – and on the
projects by Archigram, Archizoom, U.F.O., Soleri, and by groups named
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 4

under the category “Utopia”. The November 1968 number of Domus, for
instance, published the reproduction of the Milanogram, the installation
13. Red., “Il “Milanogram” alla Triennale”,
presented by Archigram UK and US groups at the Triennale13. Domus 468 (November 1968): 40-43.

An anonymous group, self-named “00”, based in Turin, published on

Marcatré a declaration of dispute on the contest Grand Prix International
d’Architecture et d’Urbanisme announced for the city of Cannes, together
with the reproduction of the manifesto-call for the Memorial Day march in
Berkley. Their aim was to call the entire society to participate to the debate
on the growth of the city: “Choose a city (choose it yourself, all are fine),
we convene everybody, discuss exploitations, transform the theatres and
the churches in places for public discussion: put the power in brackets (if
you can). The urban fetish may safely fall; no one will get hurt. Will we be
able to dissolve the knots of repressions every time they are born? (the 14. Gruppo 00, Torino, “Relazione di un
gruppo di assistenti della Facoltà di
only role that the intellectual can play is that of the anti-policeman). If we Architettura e architetti di Torino (Gruppo 00)
per il concorso di Cannes 1970 (Grand Prix
cannot do this, it is perfectly useless for us to plan or judge or discuss. International d’Urbanisme et d’Architecture)”,
Marcatrè, 46/49 (1968): 72-74.
Can we do it? Every alternative is a lie”14.

Utopia and/or Revolution

The highly political “00” statement, together with the raising interest for
15. On this item we must remember at least:
the utopian projects15, well explains the organization of the conference in Lewis Mumford, “Utopia, the City and the
Machine”, Daedalus, 94, 2, (Spring 1965), 271-
Turin. At the beginning of 1969, the “Unione Culturale”, a leftist association 292, which outlines the relationship between
city, technology and utopia.
born in the aftermath of the Liberation on the initiative of leading
intellectuals such as Pavese, Bobbio, Casorati, Mila and others, directed
at that time by the theatre critic Edoardo Fadini, promoted the idea of an
exhibition-conference focused on contemporary architecture and titled
16. Red., “Conferences”, Architectural Design,
“Utopia and experimentalism” (as announced in international magazines March 1969, 128; the reported title is Utopia &
experiment in the architecture of today.
such as Architectural Design)16.

Initially the Turin’s meeting seemed to faithfully reproduce the one
held in Folkestone in 1966 promoted by the Archigram group together
with the Metropole Art Centre and the British Architectural Students
Association: the International Dialogue of Experimental Architecture
[Fig. 2]17, which set up a playful debate against the “modern tradition”,
17. International Exhibition of Experimental
Architecture: The New Metropole Arts Centre,
Folkestone, 6-30 June 1966; Craig Buckleym,
“International Dialogue of Experimental
Architecture (IDEA)”, Radical Pedagogies,
E17, http://radical-pedagogies.com/
search-cases/e17-international-dialogue-
experimental-architecture-idea/ dir. by B.
Colomina.

enhancing the new tendencies and with no connection with the past
18. Piero Derossi’s memory of those days
and even with the present18. The Turinese architect Pietro Derossi had is in P. Derossi, Per un’architettura narrativa.
Architetture e progetti 1959-2000 (Milan: Skirà,
taken part to it and he was probably one of the inspirers of the Italian 2000): 36-38.
program19. In fact, the very first proposal stated: “This initiative aims a
19. On the teaching changes at the
critical analysis of the proposals appearing in the international limelight Politecnico di Torino, regarding specifically
the design disciplines and the people
of experimental architecture intended either as a paroxysmal forcing of involved in the conference, see Elena
Dellapiana, “Da dove vengono i designer
current technological and social trends or as an attempt to foreshadow a (se non si insegna il design)? Torino dagli
anni Trenta ai Sessanta”, QuAD, 1, 2017,
global alternative for the organization of inhabited spaces”20. forthcoming.

The list of architects invited was very rich. From UK, the Archigram
group, the elder Cedric Price and Arthur Quarmbly both interested in 20. Unione Culturale Franco Antonicelli
Archives, AS 282, Mostra convegno “UTOPIA
pre-fabrication and plastic materials; Theo Crosby, architect-artist and e/o rivoluzione. 25-27 aprile 1969, w.d.
5 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

curator; the architectural critic Reiner

Banham. From France, Yona Friedman;
the groups Utopie and Architecture
Principe; the Situationist artist Constant
(Nieuwenhuys)21. From Japan, the
Metabolist group and Kenzo Tange. From
USSR, the NER group, previously invited
by Giancarlo De Carlo at the 1968 Milan
Triennale22. From USA, the ‘Maestro’
Buckminster Fuller, Michael Webb, one of
the Archigram founders; David Greene.

The invitation of the Soviet and

Japanese architects was subjected
to the financial contribution of
their respective national architects
associations; so, in the final program
their names disappeared together with
the American ones, substituted by the
Italian Paolo Soleri, active in USA but FIG. 2 IDEA Folkestone registration form, 1966

born and trained in Turin, and the Italian-

American Romualdo Giurgola23. The list of the participants was not the 21. The “Internazionale Situazionista” had
a base in Alba, Piedmont, where Constant
only variation in the final program of the event: the exhibition-conference lived for a short period in 1956; see
Stefano Taccone (ed.), Contro l’infelicità.
title changed in Utopia e/o Rivoluzione and the organizers were the Unione L’Internazionale Situazionista e la sua attualità,
(Verona: Ombre Corte, 2014).
Culturale together with some assistants and students of the Faculty
22. Masha Panteleyeva, “Alexei Gutnov, the
of Architecture of Turin. Derossi testifies that the contestation of the NER Group (“New Element of Settlement”)
and Giancarlo De Carlo”, Radical Pedagogies,
teaching system and the spurs for its greater involvement in society were http://radical-pedagogies.com/search-
cases/e06-moscow-institute-architecture-
originated by the assistants and that the students followed them later24: triennale-milano/, dir. by B. Colomina.

the youngest among the teaching class pushed explicitly towards a more 23. Unione Culturale Franco Antonicelli
Archives, AS 282, Mostra convegno “UTOPIA
political approach and so the word Revolution appeared in the title [Fig. 3]. e/o rivoluzione. 25-27 aprile 1969, Typescript
Program, March 1969.
The aim was to stimulate the architects belonging to the “utopian party”,
24. Interview in Emanuele Piccardo, Dopo la
who believed in technological advancement as an advancement of the rivoluzione. Azioni e protagonisti dell’architettura
radicale 1963-1973, (Busalla: Plug in, 2009),
discipline itself, to reflect and discuss about the possibility of taking on a role with DVD.

in the social and economical changes and in the “soft” revolution derived 25. For example, the “150 hours” program:
a training program thought as a solution
from the larger sharing of the instruments of political interpretation . The 25
against illiteracy of the working classes in
the post-war period, now intended for an
structure of the meeting was based on confrontation: the speeches by exchange between workers and students
and concentrated on reading Marx and the
the invited architects illustrated their design approaches in relationship theoreticians of the left-wing. See Francesco
Lauria, Le 150 ore per il diritto allo studio.
with the changing society; downstream of this, the participants had to Analisi, memoria, echi di una straordinaria
esperienza sindacale, (Roma: Edizioni Lavoro
discuss about the relation and the overlapping between the utopia and the 2011).
possible revolutionary actions, exploring meanings and functions both of
the architecture and urban planning and of the social challenges; finally,
a third step aimed to clarify the intellectual’s role in eliminating the gap
between awareness and praxis through contacts and programs shared
with the urban stakeholders. The organizing committee had launched a
call to architects, students, intellectuals from all around the country to
contribute to the debate with a written intervention. The opening speech
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 6

FIG. 3 Marcatrè 52/55, 1969, w.p.

by the U e/o R (aka Utopia e/o Rivoluzione) was discussed by the first
promoters (architects Giorgio Ceretti, Graziella and Pietro Derossi,
Riccardo Rosso, Adriana Ferroni, Aimaro d’Isola and Elena Tamagno)
with the professor of philosophy Gianni Vattimo, the historian Gian Mario
Bravo, the historian of architecture Carlo Olmo and the physicist Arnaldo
Ferroni. Furthermore, among the participants in the debate we find the
Milanese Emilio Battisti and Giovanni di Maio, Jean-Pierre Buffi (who
was working in Paris in Prouvé’s atelier) and architect Vittorio Gregotti
(from the editorial board of Marcatré and director of Edilizia Moderna).
The “artistic” and performing part was represented by Egi Volterrani
and by “Assemblea Teatro”, a theatrical research group in which some
architecture students took part, in connection with the “Unione Culturale”
26. Gabriella Pecetto Amodei, L’Unione
director, Emilio Fadini26. The overlapping of different approaches, maybe Culturale di Torino. Trent’anni di storia
1945/1975, MD thesis, University of Turin,
the most evident result of the Radical season, was explicitly declared 1981, sup. Prof. Claudio Dellavalle, 217-219.
in the introductory report, which underlined the “old” problem of the
architect as a technician and an artist at the meantime. The same idea
was represented in the manifesto [Fig. 4] of the conference designed by
Derossi and Isola, a collage of sentences about utopia and revolution
due to theorists from different times and places: the “fathers” of utopia
Plato, Thomas More, Tommaso Campanella, Fourier, Etiénne Cabet,
and then Marx, Engels, Proudhon, Robert Owen, Babeuf, Mao, Martin
Buber, Karl Mannheim, Nicolas Schoffer, György Lukács, Adorno and
Horkheimer, Nicola Abbagnano, Robert Merton, March Bloch, Ferruccio
Rossi Landi, Henri Lefebvre – all Marxist thinkers, historians, sociologists
and economists; and then the architects or critics Manfredo Tafuri,
7 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

Giulio Carlo Argan, Le Corbusier, the Utopie group,

Renato De Fusco, Alexei Gutnov, Louis Kahn, Yona
Friedman, Paolo Soleri, Michel Ragon, Thomas
A. Reiner, Ludovico Quaroni, Leonard Reissmann,
Filiberto Menna. They all offered definitions of
utopia and revolutionary ideas applied to the city
development together with the slogans stated by
the different student movements and parties, in a
confused and cheerful mix used as a background
for the title of the conference painted in large red
letters27. Reading those quotations in any direction
or order highlights the recurrence of words as
technique, progress, future, but also joy, equality,
pleasantness, well representing the different souls
of the contestation typical of the Sixties28.

The same fluctuation permeated the three days

of the conference, in which the interventions, all
prepared and delivered in advance with a graphic
documentation29 were mixed to the protests at
the limit of performing: one of them was held by
a group of students with the Assemblea Teatro FIG. 4 Poster by Piero Derossi and Aimaro Isola, Unione Culturale
members, who laid down on the floor  from  the Franco Antonicelli Archives, AS 282, Mostra convegno
“UTOPIA e/o rivoluzione. 25-27 aprile 1969, w.d.
front of the building all the way to the entrance of
the hall where the conference took place, forcing those who wanted to
enter to walk on them; a more “revolutionary” one was driven by the Utopie
group: as remembered by Herbert Tonka, one of the leading characters,
they “wrapped a number of shitheads in toilet-paper. We held the whole
conference hostage for several hours with a leftist group called the
Vikings. The cops showed up with submachine guns, etc…”30. No other
participant remembers that as such a dramatic fact: Andrea Branzi, from
the Archizoom group, remembers the hostage keeping as made by some
students in order to distribute propaganda leaflets31, and Peter Cook,
from the Archigram group, remembers with irritation the lock-in but not
such an epic struggle32. Furthermore, the quoted Vikings were a group
of soccer supporters of one of the local teams (the Torino) with deep
political leftist sympathies, but not involved in the architecture debate.
27. Unione Culturale Franco Antonicelli
Archives, AS 282, Mostra convegno “UTOPIA
e/o rivoluzione. 25-27 aprile 1969, Posters.
28. For a general outline see Guido Crainz,
Il paese mancato. Dal miracolo economico
agli anni Ottanta, (Roma: Donzelli 2005),
187-293; on the specific of Turin, see Bruno
Bongiovanni, “Il Sessantotto studentesco e
operaio”, in Nicola Tranfaglia (ed.), Storia di
Torino. IX Gli anni della Repubblica, (Torino:
Einaudi, 1999): 779-814.
29. The Unione culturale Archive keeps the
manuscripts of the U e/o R, Soleri, Utopie,
and Architecture Principe reports.
30. Tonka interviewed in January 1997,
quoted in Jean-Louis Violeau , Utopie: in
Act, in Dessauce, Marc (ed.), The Inflatable
Moment: Pneumatics and Protest in ‘68, (New
York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1999):
49.
31. Interview collected by Sara Abrate,
September 2017.

Anyway, this episode reflects both those years mood and the purpose of 32. Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture
without Architecture, (London: MIT, 2005):
the organizers, which wanted to mix and contaminate a theoretic debate 187.

on the architect’s role with the more actual every day people’s problems
– house, work, pollution, briefly all the issues of the class struggle –
and make the university ‘permeable’ to people’s daily life. Gesture and
theory, utopia and revolution were the two sides between whom the
debate unfolded reflecting the slogan “workers and students united in the
33. Gian Vittorio Avondo, Il ’68 a Torino,
struggle” facing Turin’s social emergencies in the city and in its territory33. (Torino: Il Capricorno, 2017).
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 8

Day 1: build

The conference contributions opened with

Romualdo Giurgola34, an Italian architect born
in 1920 and emigrated in USA in the post-war,
active member of the editorial staff of Interiors
magazine, dean of the Columbia University School
of Architecture and Planning. His approach was by
and large conciliatory: he distanced himself from
radicalism and invoked a change of design scale -
from the city to the region - in order to incorporate
and dilute the project subject measured in large
numbers35 and to accompany – not impose –
the transformations in place. His speech tried
to demonstrate the architect’s ability to control
development processes through his involvement
in decision-making since the inception. Quoting
Friedman’s work, he presented the idea of a
‘participated design’ based on the “advocacy
planning” model, with an experiment made with FIG. 5 Aldo Giurgola, Page from Use or Abuse. How to turn vacant
storefronts, buildings and lots into community assets, Marcatrè
his students at Columbia: the booklet Use or Abuse. 52/55 (1969), w.p.
How to turn vacant storefronts, buildings and lots into
community asset, which had the aim to illustrate the program for an early
urban regeneration [Fig. 5].

Another non-conflictive position was that of Paolo Soleri36, an Italian 34. https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/
pab/app/ar_display.cfm/23058; Ehrman B.
architect, Giurgola’s coetaneous, who trained at Wright’s Taliesin school Mitchell, Mitchell Giurgola architects, (New
York: Rizzoli International, 1983).
and established in Arizona at the end of the Fifties: he presented his 35. One further document signed by
Giurgola and his colleagues Peter Blake
Archology project – a Weltanschauung, indeed – published in a long article (from Columbia University), David Crane
(University of Pensylvania) and Donlyn
in Domus the following month37. In order to make theory practical, his aim Lyndon (MIT), and titled The Large number.
City and territory transformations, was part of
was to look forward to the proto-historic roots of mankind, in an ethic the Unione Culturale documentation for the
preparation of the conference; now in Prof.
more than political vision. His projects, urban clusters grafted in the desert Riccardo Bedrone’s (one of the students
involved in the organization) archive.
(such as Soleri’s atelier in Scottsdale), floating on the ocean or hidden in
36. Antonietta Jolanda Lima, Paolo Soleri:
the natural landscape [Fig. 6], were focused on energy self-sufficiency, DIY, architettura come archeologia umana, (Milano:
Jaca Book, 2000); in Unione Culturale
almost without any relationship with ideological approaches, according to Archives, Torino, (AS 282) is kept a further,
unpublished long document of 12 pages,
the Whole Hearth catalogue mood38 mixed with the growing cybernetics in telling a detailed program of the Cosanti
Foundation, its previewed developments and
which, in Soleri’s mind, technology was turning39. expected results.

37. Red. “Quella che Soleri chiama

The following speakers belonged to the generation closer to the young Arcologia: Architettura + Ecologia”, Domus
474 (May 1969): 54-65.
protesters; they had been trained during the post-war years and were
38. Andrew G. Kirk, Green Counterculture.
promoters of interdisciplinary, non-academic groups, in contrast with The Whole Hearth Catalog and American
Environmentalism, (Lawrence: University
those of just a decade or so older. Press of Kansas, 2007).
39. Marcatré, 50/55 (1969): 52; Norbert
Architecture Principe, consisting of Paul Virilio and Claude Parent40, Wiener’s writings were in that years re-edited
and revisited living a new season of critical
corrected the original meeting title in Anomy and Revolution and focused success.
on sociological and political aspects, identifying the “class” of anomists 40. An overview on this French group
activity is John Armitage, Virilio for Architects,
(anomie = lawlessness, i.e. the outcasts, the foreign workers excluded (Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge 2015).

even by the proletariat) as the unbalancing element of the future society

9 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

and the revolutionary spring. The disequilibrium is

also the characterizing element of the architectures
they showed, not mentioned in the report,
totally alien to functionalist logics and connoted
exclusively by the oblique “direction”41 [Fig. 7].
They explained their point of view as the transition
from an industrial to a post-industrial system:

“What, through Communism, was yesterday still

the will of appropriation of the production means, has
been transformed into the will of appropriation of the
social space, of the communication and information
medias”42.

Day 2: theorize and provoke

The English Archigram group’s report started from

the final statement of the opening speech about the
class struggle. Their interpretation of class-system
was far from the organizers’ challenges and their aim FIG. 6 Paolo Soleri, “Archology scheme”, in Marcatrè 52/55
to keep away from the radical politics of the new left (1969), w.p.

was quite evident. Archigram’s attitude, perceived as a lack of political 41. The published projects are La fonction
oblique (1965-1967) and Les Inclisites
involvement, “cool” and somehow liberalist, was centred on individual (1968), Both are in the FRAC Centre-val de
Loire Archives (http://www.frac-centre.fr/
freedom and on the role that architects could play in promoting it43. The collection-art-architecture/architecture-
principe-58.html?authID=10).
addressed topic was the relationship between the designed space, mainly
42. Marcatrè 50/55 (1969): 59-60.
urban, and individual freedoms. Their thesis was that space changes could
43. Marcatrè 50/55 (1969): 62-79; Simon
influence social dynamics, using the technical improvements too. The field Sadler, Archigram. Architecture without
Architecture, (Cambridge-London: MIT Press,
of action is the middle-calls miliéu and the chosen example a university 2005): 177-187; the Archigram’s archives are
on line: http://archigram.westminster.ac.uk/.
project, already published on the January number of Casabella44, focused 44. Carlo Pelliccia, Pietro Sartogo, “Campus
Design”, Casabella 332 (January 1969), 12-
on the initiatives for the changes to the academic structure, pyramidal 16. The 2/3 (Control and Choice), 7 (Pod
Living) and 9 (Ideas Circus) pictures are both
at the time, that was to become more “liquid” and pervasive thanks to in Archigram’s presentation in Turin and in
“Casabella” article.
the new communication systems. Control and Choice [Fig. 8] partially
45. Yona Friedman, L’architecture mobile,
published in Casabella and presented at the 1967 Paris Biennial, was (Bruxelles: Centre d’Etudes Architecturales,
1967).
illustrated through a sequence of pictures representing the networking
idea of connected but independent people able to accept
and elaborate -or refuse- the circulating information.

Yona Friedman’s contribution was based on mobility too.

An elder architect who had been involved in the legendary
10th CIAM congress (1956) where he had presented his
Mobile Architecture theory45, in Turin he took a further step
forward: mobility is either physical, social and cultural. The
possibilities of learning thanks to the information spreading
allow both the quick replacement of dominant groups and
the improvement of knowledge, making people more and
more independent from specialists and professionals.
FIG. 7 Architecture Principe, “Architecture oblique”, in
In such a flux-society, architects, intended as traditional Marcatrè 52/55 (1969), w.p.
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 10

design managers, were loosing their role

and therefore they had to reform it to
achieve the necessary connections with the
new social asset. The proposed solution,
L’Architecture mobile, L’extension de Paris vers
la hauteur [Fig. 9] reflected the idea of an
architect able to categorize all the possible
industrialized elements replaceable and
combinable with each other. Straddling self-
construction and scientific dissemination,
Friedman’s suggestions showed in a more
utopian way, with regard with dimensions
and technological progress: the same FIG. 8 Archigram, “Control and Choice”, in Marcatrè 52/55 (1969), w.p.

approach had been discussed in the 1965

number of Edilizia Moderna46, in which the
possibility to cross and overlap architecture
and design with the common denominator
of industrialization, in order to obtain an
architecture definitely thought and made
by industrial designers47 [Fig. 10], was
illustrated by several Italian and international
architects and designers. Furthermore,
Friedman’s political vision added to his
own methodology a democratic value due
to people’s involvement in participating
projects not as ‘dilettanti’ but as ‘almost
experts’ who share information and
knowledge.
FIG. 9 Yona Friedman, “Extension de Paris vers la hauteur”, in Marcatrè
A similar superposition between 52/55 (1969), w.p.

architecture and design, buildings and items, project and social vision was
46. Edilizia Moderna, n. 85 (1965) was
the sub-track of the presentation of the French Utopie group, somehow entirely dedicated to Design with articles
and interview to the most authoritative
twin and rival of his English counterpart Archigram48. Jean Auber and protagonists of international discussion
on industrial design. The director Vittorio
Huber Tonka, representing the two sides of the group (architects and Gregotti was in Turin and involved in the
debate.
sociologists), repeated the principles and the slogans launched in the
47. I.e. the article by Enzo Frateili, “Design
magazine Utopie49. Titled Utopia is not to be written in the future form50, e edilizia”, Edilizia Moderna, 85 (1965): 74-
81. Aldo Norsa, Raimonda Riccini (eds.),
their report stated from the very beginning that the dichotomy Utopia/ Enzo Frateili, un protagonista della cultura del
design e dell’architettura, (Milan: Accademia
Revolution was a petty bourgeois problem. In turn, collecting all the spurs University Press, 2017).
from Lefebvre’s “dialectical materialism”, the French students’ protests, 48. The most relevant legacy of Utopie group
is the theoretical work by Jean Baudrillard,
the Fuller’s scientific-technological thoughts and the Pop aesthetic, they one of the founder members, whose Le
système des objets was published in 1968
tried to unmask the middle-class dream of progress and soft revolution (Paris, Gallimard).
49. Craig Buckley and Jean-Louis Violeau
as well as the “institutional” lies (referring to the Paris transformations (eds.), Utopie. Texts and Projects, 1967-1978,
(Cambridge- London: MIT Press, 2007).
promoted by De Gaulle). They accused those who had talked about
50. Marcatré, 50/55 (1969): 86; The same
Utopia to deliberately place the changes out of the sphere of the possible; text, translated in French, is in the Unione
Culturale Franco Antonicelli Archive, Torino -
then, they explored the sequence of “utopians” from the Classic to the probably printed as a flyer to be distributed in
the course of the squatting-performance.
Modern ages and summed up denying any possible change given by the
11 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

utopian theories, except for the one preserving the status quo
and corrupting the working class with unachievable dreams.
The “Imagination”, one of the main topics of the 1968 season
of contestations, became an almost negative attitude – if
considered as an escape from the real challenge: the realization
of the philosophical Marxist utopia. The images illustrating this
“struggle against all” represented the political attitude pillorying
the Power (the market system, the new Les Halles district in
Paris) and the technical achievements (satellites, computers,
nuclear central, new airplanes such as the Concorde) without
almost any relationship with architecture as a discipline. [Fig.
11]

The only Italian group, excepted the organizers, was

the Archizoom, whose report was scheduled between the
Friedman’s and the Utopie’s ones51. Their contribution to the
congress topic was the less inclusive among all: they simply
FIG. 10 E. Frateili, “Design e edilizia”, Edilizia moderna,
referred to their text – Relazione politica (Political Report) – 85 (1965), 75.
refusing to read it: “I believe that after all that has been said
yesterday and today, up to Friedman, it is useless to try to disassemble
this conference ideologically or politically. Making a political speech at
51. Marcatrè, 50/55 (1969): 96-100.
the moment is out of place, because this does not even seem to me a
52. Ivi: 117; Roberto Gargiani, Archizoom
conference to make a political speech. The conference is already over for Associati 1966-1974. Dall’onda Pop alla
superficie neutra, (Milan: Electa, 2007): 132-
us”52. 133.
53. Archizoom, “Il teatro impossibile”,
Derossi answered them rhetorically asking what was the meaning Pianeta Fresco 2-3 (Winter 1968): 99-103;
about the magazine Pianeta fresco, see Mario
of “political” in Archizoom mind, and which was its relationship with Maffi, La cultura Underground, (Bologna:
Odoya, 2009); Martina Spalla, Le Origini della
architecture, considering the fact that “the group is known for a disciplinary sostenibilità ambientale nel progetto italiano.
Dibattiti ed esiti tra il dopoguerra e la crisi
energetica, DM thesis, Politecnico di Torino,
work aimed at inventing objects a bit snobbish and mischievous; we would sup. Elena Dellapiana, a.a. 2016-17.
like to know how these design activities that constitute
their real practice fit in with their political aspirations”;
he also underlined the influence of Archizoom’s work on
the No stop city (1968) and on the quantitative idea of
the space occupied and anthropized to be unstructured,
unbalanced, kept homogeneous and, at most, modified
through styling operations “placing on the roof palms or
ostrich feathers”. Nevertheless, the images chosen to
publish their paper in Marcatré illustrated not the urban
project but two among the Theatres published on Pianeta
Fresco [Figs. 12-13], the self-printed, countercultural
magazine created by Fernanda Pivano with Allen
Ginsberg as deputy director (irresponsible director) and
Ettore Sottsass jr. as art director (head of the gardens)53.

The different reports were interspersed with the debate

during the first two days (April 25th and 26th), while the
FIG. 11 Utopie group, Page of the fanzine, Marcatrè 52/55
third one was entirely devoted to the discussion and the (1969), w.p.
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 12

attempt to define some shared conclusions.

Day 3: why Utopia? (To say nothing of Revolution)

Some “party official” directions (i.e. the request to set up a

committee of censorship or use bodyguards to protect the
speakers) were refused by the organizers, who supported
the assembly procedure despite the risk of disputes and
interruptions – as it happened to Friedman, booed by students.

The debate discussed the typical topics of those years: the

necessity to stay on a theoretical level in order to avoid falling
into individualisms; the interpretation of pivotal words such
as “Revolution”; the role played by the reference thinkers – i.e.
Marx and Engels; more general categories such as “spirituality”,
“technique” and “change”. On the other hand, especially the
group of Derossi among the others, repeatedly tried to focus
the debate on architecture. No discussion followed the
Architecture Principe’s report, substituted by the projection of
the documentary May June 1968 by the young film-maker Jean
Pierre Prévost, trained at the Nanterre school together with
FIG. 12 Utopie group, L’utopie s’ecrit pas au future,
Baudrillard54. Unione Culturale Franco Antonicelli
Archives, AS 282, Mostra convegno “UTOPIA
e/o rivoluzione. 25-27 aprile 1969, w.d.
The debate, although often elliptical and unclear, highlighted
an interesting outlook on the future developments and consequences of
54. Prévost was the author of the first
the contestation season. documentary in 1966 (15 minn. b&w), on
the Sainte-Bernadette-du-Banlay church,
by Architecture Principe group (Cité de
The controversy about the Archigram statements, which seemed to l’Architecture Archives, Paris).

renounce to control the information flow, together with the discussion

about the role of architects and universities, offered glimpses of
innovation, summing up, the possibilities coming from the contamination
between architecture and other disciplines. Swinging between reality
and theoretical speculation (referring to Marxism), dialectic and
historical materialism (Utopie), the contradictions of the contemporary
middle class and the revolutionary perspectives of the proletariat (Buffi,
Dimaio), the Day 3 showed two opposite approaches: the attempt at
change within architecture and its demystification. The gap between
revolutionary and/or utopian positions and the “real” world – intended
as building, city planning, goods production and market, all linked to the
capitalistic system – was another subject of the debate, focusing on the
actions to be taken to heal contradictions. The Utopie group’s rejection
of the traditional profession and their creation of items intended for the
market (such as the pneu objects, showed at the 1968 exhibition Structure
Gonfable in Museé d’Art Moderne of Paris)55 suggested to Giorgio Deferrari 55. The exhibition is quoted by Pierre
Restany as an example of ART exhibition to
new questions on this topic, which had already been developed the year explain the new artistic trends, talking about
Utopie group as “sociologists of urban space;
before during the 14th Milano Triennale dedicated to the Exhibition of the Pierre Restany, “M. Le livre blanc de l’art
total”, in Domus 469 (December 1969): 41-50.
Great Number. At the Triennale, the Blow armchair by De Pas, D’Urbino
13 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1

and Lomazzi with Carla Scolari, produced by Zanotta and later

becomed the most sold ever inflatable chair, had represented
somehow a paradox: a very popular object and at the same time
a symbol of the cultural and political change in act. The point
of contact between theory and practice were the technological
advancement and its formal change following another paradox:
the involvement of the producer company in the industrial
experimentation56. In the Turin event, these items started a
dispute about the technology applicability: Archigram was
accused to make people dream an impossible and elitist future;
Utopie claimed, in turn, its use of futuristic technologies as a
tool to make people free in a Marxian logic, passing through,
and beyond, the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The conference thus ended without bringing a shared vision:

the organizing group proposed a motion, voted by a large
majority, to continue the debate in the future.
FIG. 13 Archizoom, “Teatro privato del potere”, in
Marcatrè 52/55 (1969), w.p.

Echoes, debates and legacies

The Turin conference was maybe the last occasion to put together
Utopia and Revolution in the 1960s architecture. “Utopia” remained as a
critical category drawing a red line from Classic utopians such as Fourier
or Owen to Archigram, Metabolists or Buckminster Fuller; “Revolution”,
following Emil Kauffmann ideas, became a meta-category including
Boulleé, Ledoux and even Le Corbusier57 or any architect who had
promoted significant changes in the interpretation of architecture.
The legacy of Turin conference is anyway at least double: even if it
didn’t have a large success, its results were echoed in many reviews and
remarks. L’Unità, the official newspaper of the Italian Communist Party,
published an article on the possible role of the architects as guides to
change and serve the society and the revolutionary pressures58. The
same newspaper dedicated to the conference two reviews, both signed
by the art historian Paolo Fossati59. In the same pages reporting the
struggles of the Politecnico’s students together with the FIAT workers,
the beginning of the “Prague winter”, the De Gaulle’s resignation after the
French constitutional referendum, the anti-fascist demonstrations of 25
April and the preparation of those of the first of May, Fossati tried to frame
the conference program after the first day in a more general Zeitgeist.
He underlined the risk that the architect’s role could slide from technical
into intellectual and feared the difficulty for the architects in becoming
“System watchdog”, who had to transform the utopian and revolutionary
concepts in operating solutions. Fossati’s final assessment observed that
the gap between the exposure of approaches, projects and case studies
and their placement in a framework of political urgency was perhaps too
abrupt as these were often interrupted by ideological or simply trivial
56. Santino Limonta, (ed.), De Pas D’Urbino
Lomazzi, (Milano: RDE Ricerche Design
Editrice, 2012); Marc Dessauce (ed.), The
Inflatable Moment: Pneumatics and Protest in
‘68, (New York: Princeton Architectural Press,
1999); Sean Topham, Blowup: Inflatable Art,
Architecture and Design, (Monaco: Prestel,
2002).
57. Kauffmann published Three Revolutionary
Architects: Boullée, Ledoux, Lequeu in 1952
(translated in Italian in 1976), pointing out
the double role they have played: disrupt the
old architectural order and build a new one.
His works on the Enlightenment architecture
had large critical fortune during the decade;
in turn Aldo Rossi published his Introduzione
a Boullée in 1967 as a foreword of his
translation: Etienne-Louis Boullée, Architettura,
saggio sull’arte, (Padova: Marsilio, 1967);
Anthony Vidler, “Neoclassical Modernism:
Emil Kaufmann”, in Histories of the Immediate
Present: Inventing Architectural Modernism.
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 2008).
58. Franco Berlanda, “Mostra-dibattito
sull’architettura”, in L’Unità, April 25th 1969: 7.
59. Paolo Fossati, “L’architetto cerca il
suo ruolo”, in L’Unità, April 26th 1969, 9; Id.,
“Diagnosi per l’architettura”, in L’Unità, April
30th 1969: 9.
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle. 14

stances. Furthermore, the interpretations of the two

jambs of the debate (Utopia and Revolution) were too
distant one from the other, while a shared meaning
was needed for the debate to go on. Fossati feared
the idea of a sort of “super-language”, (intellectual,
sociological and technical) able to “transform the
architectural speech in a political or even revolutionary
fact” and he stigmatized the excess of schematization
occurred in the Turin conference.

The review of the conference published on

Casabella60 was written by Paolo Nepoti, at that time
one of the Nizzoli’s firm collaborators. He keenly
synthetized how to put together architecture, urban
planning, utopia and revolution could be nothing else
but to set up a surprise, something unforeseeable.
He focused on the different approaches and outlined
the different guiding roles: one more political referred
to the organizing group’s document, and one
more theoretical, linked to the Utopie group based
on Lefebre’s theories. Between them he heard a FIG. 14 Archizoom, “Teatro impossibile”, in Pianeta fresco, 2-3
(1968), w.p.
“background noise” concerning very different items:
the cancellation of the architect’s role, the trap of the utopian dream
without any means to become reality, the contradictions within the
bourgeoisie.

Also Controspazio reviewed the conference with the contribution of
Emilio Battisti, one of the participants in the debate, colleague and friend
of the organizing group, junior assistant professor at the Polytechnic
of Milan . Following Engels’s statements, he first
61
60. Paolo Nepoti, “Utopia e/o Rivoluzione”, in
Casabella 337 (June 1969), w.p.
61. Emilio Battisti, “Utopia e/o Rivoluzione.
Note sulla mostra-incontro tenutosi a
Torino nei giorni 25-26-27 Aprile 1969”, in
Controspazio, 2-3 (July-August 1969): 45-47.

defined a clear relationship between Utopia and

Revolution, connecting them by their roots in the
historical moments and with the intellectuals’ ability
to interpret the needs of any social oppressed class.
The fruitful century-long dialogue between Utopia and
Architecture, made the latter somehow independent
and separated from the real social necessities,
independently explored by sociologists such as
Mumford, Riesman or Mannheim. On the contrary,
the meeting of these two research fields could put
back in contact Architecture and Utopia – but the
problems of the revolution still were to be clarified.
Battisti underlined the discussion on the architect’s
role, which during the conference founded new
meanings and possible results: the conclusion was
FIG. 15 Strum Group, Utopie photo story, in Emilio Ambasz (ed.),
that if the role of the architect in the field of utopias Italy the new domestic Landscape. Achievement and
Problems of Italian Design, (New York: The Museum of
could be discussed, then this professionals were Modern Art – Florence: Centro DI, 1972)
15 Histories of PostWar Architecture 2 | 2018 | 1
not completely subjected to neo-capitalism and therefore they could be
the bearers of anticipatory visions, but – he concluded – “Revolution is
something else!”.
The Archizoom’s reports at the Turin conference was published on a
number of L’architecture d’Aujourd’hui entirely devoted to innovations –
such as communication, robotics, landscape, politics and more generally
design-thinking approaches . Many among the participants kept in touch
62
and begun mutual visitings, as happened to Piero Derossi, later invited in
London by Peter Cook63.
Despite the rich publishing activities (Architecture Principe, Utopie,
Archigram and several self-produced magazines)64 and the growing
notoriety worldwide, the topics addressed in Turin seemed not to have
almost any effect – probably because of the thinning of the political
engagement due to the tightening struggle which became violent and
turned in terrorism during the following decade65.
Furthermore, while some elder protagonists – such as Soleri or
Friedman - continued and developed their original proposals, and the
66
“middle generation” – the British and French groups – stopped their
activities for different reasons around the end of the decade, the younger
ones – the students and some of the young professionals – developed
the spurs from the debate in different ways and began to play a role in the
so-named “Radical design season”67. The Italian groups68, who were all
born few years before the conference, had been working on both utopian
and revolutionary – intended as contrary to the bourgeois ways of life –
projects.
Several of their works, already published on Domus, Marcatré, Casabella
and other magazines, were included in the exhibition Italy the new
domestic Landscape. Achievement and Problems of Italian Design curated
by Emilio Ambasz at New York MoMA in 197269. This – the largest and
richest exhibition ever held up by the MoMA to that moment – proposed a
section of invited authors, the Environments, with a sub-section devoted to
the Counterdesign as Postulation which included Ugo La Pietra, Archizoom,
Superstudio, Gruppo Strum70. Theirs all were not-architectural projects:
La Pietra’s one was related with the possibilities offered by the new media
and a futurist networked city; Archizoom’s proposed a “poetic-reaction”
neutral space; Superstudio proposed an environment without objects
recalling the American Whole Earth Catalogue spurs; the Strum group’s
project was the only one focused on political topics. The free distribution
of Fotoromanzi (photo-stories) to the visitors aimed at sensitizing the
public to the social problems, pointing three topics: The struggle for
Housing, referring to the relationship between the proletariat houses and
factory work; Utopia, summing up the position held in Turin completed
with “data and documents”; The mediatory City, concerning the possible
actions to be taken to solve the problems of the capitalist city. The word
62. Andrea Branzi, Gilberto Corretti, Paolo
Deganello, Massimo Morozzi, “Archizoom”,
in L’architecture d’Aujourd’hui, 145 (September
1969): LXV- LXVIII.
63. He continued, from a theoretical point
of view, his reasoning on the political
implication of architecture; Evelina Calvi,
Piero Derossi, Carlo Giammarco, Aimaro
Isola, La città nella giostra del Capitale, (Torino:
Bookstore 1979).
64. These and other magazines are taken
stok in Beatriz Colomina, Craig Bukley (eds.),
Clip, Stamp, Fold: The Radical Architecture of
Little Magazines 196X to 197X, (New York:
Actar, 2011).
65. Even some of the participant in the Turin
conference were arrested as member of
armed groups; Elena Dellapiana, Annalisa
B. Pesando, “In front of and behind the
Mirror. Women in Italian Radical Design”,
in Women Designers, Architects and Civil
Engineers between 1969-1989, MoMoWo 3rd
International Conference-Workshop, ed. by
Ana Fernandez, forthcoming.
66. Both developed and disseminated their
original statements, Soleri the Archology in a
sustainable meaning as showed, for example
in the participation by Sven Bjork, L’ arcologia
di Paolo Soleri: Citta a immagine dell’uomo,
un’alternativa al collasso urbano / relazione
di Sven Bjork alla Conferenza di Stoccolma
sull’ambiente urbano (giugno 1972) (Roma:
USIS, 1973) and Friedman the utopian
approach, once again reaffirmed in the
interview given to Sara Abrate (September
2017) about the Turin conference. Yona
Friedman, Tetti (Macerata: Quodlibet, 2017).
67. The word “radical” which recurs often in
the conference speeches and in the debate
as a normal adjective, became “officially”
the definition of an heterogeneous group,
from 1971 thanks to Celant, following whom,
magazines, exhibition, manifestoes began
to use the word as a noun; Germano Celant,
“Senza titolo”, in IN. Argomenti e Immagini di
design, 2-3, (March-June 1971): 76-81; some
examples are the very famous 372 number
of Casabella (December 1972), directed by
Alessandro Mendini, the Paola Navone,
Bruno Orlandoni, Architettura “radicale”, (Milan:
Documenti di Casabella, 1974) once again
requested by Mendini.
68. Pino Brugellis, Gianni Pettena, Alberto
Salvadori, Utopie Radicali, (Macerata:
Quodlibet 2017).
69. Elena Dellapiana, “Dalla “Casa
all’Italiana” all’Italian Style - La costruzione del
Made in Italy”, in Giovanni Erbacci, Lorenzo
Fiorucci, Giorgio Levi Antonella Rossi
Colavini, Vincenzo Sogaro (eds.), Ceramica
e arti decorative del Novecento, II, (Verona:
Zerotre, 2017), 59-87; Dario Scodeller,
“Exhibition, anti-exhibition: su alcuni
questioni espositive del Pop e del Radical
design italiano 1966-1981”, AIS/Design, #3
(2013).
70. Emilio Ambasz (ed.), Italy the new
domestic Landscape. Achievement and
Problems of Italian Design, (New York: The
Museum of Modern Art – Florence: Centro
DI, 1972): 224-267.
 Elena Dellapiana “Architettura e/o Rivoluzione” up at the Castle.
“Radical” didn’t appear in any of the exhibition categories, except for the
Celant’s essay in the catalogue titled Radical Architecture71. On the other
hand, the “utopian” topic was explored in the essay by Manfredo Tafuri,
whose Progetto e utopia was going to be published a year later72: he
pointed out the relationship between the interwar and the post-war Italian
design, both soaked with contamination with visual art73.
The legacy of the Turin conference within built architecture in Italy
followed different directions. The first, after the criticism and the
re-interpretation of megastructural buildings evoked by Friedman, Soleri
and others, addressed to the social housing districts built in the 1970s
such as the Corviale in Rome, the Zen in Palermo or the Vele in Scampia-
Naples74. A second direction, strongly influenced by US ecological and
environmental sensitivity, was the Global Tools experience of 1973, whom
Archizoom and most of the other protagonists of the Radical design
participated in: they focused the improvement of individual abilities,
mainly in DIY75.
The last direction focused on objects and domestic spaces, and aimed
at changing the middle class way of life. The house interiors were intended
both as a whole and as a sum of items – later to become icons – equally
revolutionary and produced and distributed in large numbers, such as the
famous Sacco and Blow chairs. Their designers wanted to change from
the inside the “System” against which the “young architects” had been
using the technical and commercial tools of the modern world, blurring
the borders between the professionals – architects, designers, urban
planners: this is, maybe, the only real influencing legacy of that short but
“heroic” season.
16
71. Ivi, 380-387.
72. Manfredo Tafuri, “Design and
technological utopia”, Ivi: 388-404; Id.,
Progetto e Utopia: architettura e sviluppo
capitalistico (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1973).
73. Alberto Bassi, “A new outlook: radical
design from Milan to Turin”, Time & Place:
Milano-Torino 1958-1968, exhibition catalogue
Moderna Museet, Stockolm 2008 (Gottingen:
Steidl Verlag, 2008), 36-45.
74. Alfonso Acocella, Complessi residenziali
nell’Italia degli anni Settanta. Dibattito e
tendenze progettuali, (Firenze: Alinea, 1981).
75. «Archizoom Associates, Remo Buti,
Casabella, Riccardo Dalisi, Ugo La Pietra,
9999, Gaetano Pesce, Gianni Pettena,
Review, Ettore Sottsass Jr., Superstudio, Ufo
and Zziggurat, met on January 12th, 1973 at
the editorial office of Casabella, and founded
the “Global Tools”, a system of laboratories
based in Florence for the propagation of
the use of natural materials and techniques
and related behaviors. The Global Tools
aims at stimulating the free development
of individual creativity» (Document n.1, The
Constitution, from the Bulletin Global Tools n.1).